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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/29453427">Someday, Treasure The Moments</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/ej_writer/pseuds/ej_writer'>ej_writer</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Stranger Things (TV 2016)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Art Teacher Steve Harrington, Artist AU, Colorblind Billy Hargrove, Domestic Fluff, Harringrove Week of Love 2021, Her Name Is Bunker Buster!, M/M, Post-Stranger Things 3, they get a cat</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-02-15</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-02-15</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-15 19:08:06</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>3,316</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/29453427</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/ej_writer/pseuds/ej_writer</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Steve follows his dreams.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Billy Hargrove/Steve Harrington</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>32</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>Harringrove Week of Love</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Someday, Treasure The Moments</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>For the second to last day of HWOL, I wrote for the Artist AU prompt, but this can also fit for the Teacher AU from the thirteenth! Posted to tumblr @thehairingrove.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Two years into college at IUB, he realizes he hates it.</p><p>Steve Harrington, in <em>law school</em>. It’s stupid, it’s all been a waste of his time, of his money, because he hadn’t piggy backed off of his parents like he was supposed to, and he feels lost, and he doesn’t know what to do.</p><p>Because he doesn’t want to be a lawyer, he never did, it just seemed like an easy option. The son of rich people like the Harrington’s, that was one of the few choices he had, either be a lawyer, or a doctor, and he was too stupid to be a doctor.</p><p>His mother had a law degree, and she turned out just fine, so it sounds like it’s a good idea to follow in her footsteps. But two years and a dozen courses he barely passes later, he decides he wants to be an art teacher.</p><p>In retrospect, he knows he shouldn’t have rushed into things, he should’ve taken his time with the decision to avoid this very situation, but he didn’t, and now he has to deal with it.</p><p> </p><p>At first he tries to just finish what he started, because he’s scared.</p><p>His dad always used to tell him when he couldn’t make up his mind about something important, “just wait until you get out in the world.”</p><p>That phrase had always seemed stupid when he was younger and didn’t have any responsibilities beyond normal high school duties, and he thought he’d have years before he ever had to deal with that hypothetical time Stephen Sr. warned him about so often.</p><p>But now he had bills to pay and lots of them, between school and the new apartment and Billy’s medical bills. And all of that fell on him alone, because Billy wouldn’t get medical clearance to go to work for, hell, probably the rest of his life.</p><p>So he knew he didn’t have room to be a dreamer. His dad was right, this was the real world.</p><p>For a while he’s able to hold it all down under the surface, keep all that worry and regret all bottled up inside, but when his grades start to slip and he procrastinates doing pretty much anything and everything, Billy takes notice.</p><p>They talk about it, Steve cries like a baby, and eventually they decide he should switch majors.</p><p>It makes him feel like a loser. He knows a teachers wage isn’t going to cover the rent, his student loans, the cost of the surgeries or the oxygen or anything else Billy will need on top of just normal living expenses.</p><p>But Billy tells him to do what makes him happy, that they'll find some way to make ends meet regardless, that he’s got nobody to prove anything to with what he chooses.</p><p>So Steve does, he ends up taking an extra course in the day and having night classes thrown at him, but he does it, and is it ever worth it, because in the spring of 1989, Steve graduates with a bachelor’s in education and a minor in art design.</p><p> </p><p>It ends up working out for them, even though they have to move to an even cheaper apartment and pawn the BMW, and they have to skimp on a couple of things now and again, but they’ve been through enough to know that’s not what’s important.</p><p>He wishes he could take Billy back home to California where he belonged, but they don’t have the money for it. And he knows his boyfriend understands that, knows that they’ll get there one day, so with time, seeing Billy still happy in Bloomington, the guilt slowly starts to melt away.</p><p> </p><p>Pretty soon he gets a job substituting at a Kindergarten level, and honestly, he’s so glad to be doing this instead of working for some law firm. Being around his kids, that’s where he belongs, even with their paint stained fingers touching on everything, the scissor mishaps and marker splotches all over their clothes.</p><p>But substituting for the few area schools isn’t steady enough to hold them over, so he puts that art degree to good use and does commission work on the side.</p><p>Thankfully, he finds no shortage of work in a small town like theirs. He does some murals for a few downtown businesses, decorates their storefronts with flowers and the like.</p><p>He’s also able to get a couple of the teachers he works to help him convince the principal to buy some paintings off of him to hang in the library and hallways.</p><p>They get their biggest break when the old woman below them in their apartment complex asks him to do portraits of all 30 some odd of her cats.</p><p>It payed for five whole months of groceries, and he loves cats, so he wasn’t complaining. He even threw in a bonus portrait of his and Billy’s own ragdoll cat, Bunker Buster, for free.</p><p>Billy had been the one to name the cat. Her shelter name had been something generic like Winter, since she was just a big old fluff of white, but he’d taken one look at her and told Steve her name should be Bunker Buster.</p><p>To this day he had absolutely no idea where Billy had come up with a name like that, but he had to admit it was pretty badass, even if the kitty herself was such a lazy lump of affection.</p><p> </p><p>Then the art teacher comes off of maternity leave, and the school won’t need him for a little while, so, after he’s painted enough tiny whiskers that just looking at their beloved cat perched on the couch makes his fingers twitch, he drops the last of the canvas’ off with the neighbor lady, and he’s finally got some free time.</p><p>He decides he wants to use that time to do something for his Billy, a thank you for all he sacrificed for Steve to be happy.</p><p> </p><p>Something to note about Steve is that, not that you’d be able to tell from the end result, he is a ridiculously messy painter, worse even than some of the five year olds he’s worked with.</p><p>He doesn’t have a work space of his own, there aren’t enough rooms in the apartment for that, so he has to set up at the dining table. But his messiness, it’s not just a few stray paint drips here and there, it’s smudges of paint up his arms and in his hair, all over the table and floor, anywhere but the canvas basically.</p><p>He also has a weird habit of wiping excess paint off his brushes anywhere but the palette where it’s supposed to go, up to and including the edge of the table, the inside of his wrist, or the legs of the easel. But that’s about all he uses the easel for, he tends to just give up on it and collapse it halfway through a painting, hunching over it and dragging his elbows through it instead.</p><p>Billy was a good sport about the mess, never once complaining about the stains that wouldn’t come off the white floor tiles or that stayed in the grooves of the wooden tables surface. Not even when Steve got paint on a pair of sweatpants he borrowed form Billy did he say a word. </p><p>He had gotten mad exactly one time when Bunker Buster got paint on her paws, but he’d gotten over it pretty quick when he saw Steve covered head to toe in scratches from bathing her. </p><p> </p><p>Most of the time it was Billy that served as his muse and inspiration, but when it came to making a painting <em>for</em> him instead of inspired <em>by</em> him, things didn’t come so easy.</p><p>For so long he holed himself up in the dining room doing sketch after sketch after sketch, none of them feeling quite right for what he wanted to give his boyfriend.</p><p>Eventually he decides on three paintings that go together, like the cheap printed ones they sell at the dollar store, but, of course, hopefully not so tacky.</p><p>He has to paint over some still life he painted ages ago in highschool to have three canvases all the same size, but he never liked it too much anyways. Once he starts, it takes forever to get the project done.</p><p>Especially because he’s such a slow, meticulous painter, at least on the canvas. There’s so much he has to bring together to realize what he had in mind, so many different colors that need mixed and shading and the little details.</p><p>He had tried to teach Billy to paint a few times when his hands still shook real bad after getting out of the hospital as a sort of tactile exercise, but all the nitpicky detail work drove him up the wall.</p><p>Ultimately, Billy decided it just wasn’t worth it and picked up needlework instead, sewing everything from homemade pillow cases to a teddy bear for his sister's baby when they found out she was pregnant.</p><p>For Steve though, painting did sort of the opposite. He thought it was calming to get really into fleshing out his vision, even if he had to go back and back and back just to get it right. He liked being in control.</p><p>Half the time his paintings would end up cracking because there were so many layers of paint to make up the end result, or at least the personal ones would, he’d never sell a messed up painting for money. It didn’t help either that they couldn’t afford anything better than the apple barrel paints like the school keeps stocked with.</p><p>Oil paint was a goal he'd reach someday, but for now he just walked past the eighteen dollars a tube luxury and protected his finished pieces with a coat of Mod Podge.</p><p><br/>What makes the project really drag on though is that Billy always insisted on sitting with Steve when he worked. Normally he loved it, Billy in the chair beside him, bumping their knees together and making cheeky little comments, or chuckling to himself when Steve did something goofy like smear a thumbprint of paint on his face, but it’s hard to make something secret for someone when they’re literally right beside you.</p><p>His compromise is to make Billy sit at the other end of the table, let him know it’s a surprise what he’s working on so he won’t be too nosy, but Billy’s forgetful anymore, will get up and walk behind Steve to get to the fridge completely forgetting he’s not supposed to see the canvas yet.</p><p>And Steve panics every time, without fail. He’d slam the canvas face down, cringing at how many hours of work he might’ve just ruined, and eventually he has to lay down the law if he ever wants to finish.</p><p>He’s flipped the canvas over four times in one night when he finally decides he has to put an end to it. “Billy, baby, I am never going to get this done.”</p><p>Billy raised his eyebrows, a humored little smile on his face. “You trying to get rid of me?”</p><p>“I’m trying to be productive.” Steve corrects.</p><p>“Alright, alright. If you insist.” He sighs dramatically, letting mock disappointment into his voice. “Guess I’ll go sit in the living room, all by my lonesome.”</p><p>“Bunker Buster would love to keep you company.” Steve reminds him.</p><p>“She doesn’t cuddle as good as you do.” He’s pouting, and Steve would get up and kiss him if it weren’t for the paint all over his shirt. </p><p>“It’ll be worth it, Billy. I promise.” Billy grumbles and complies, and when he turns to leave the kitchen Steve calls after him, “I love you!”</p><p>“Yeah, yeah. Love you too, Picasso.”</p><p> </p><p>It takes him four weeks.</p><p>Four weeks of scrapping ideas and mixing more and more paint and accidentally ruining a good sweatshirt with paint on the elbows. Of staying up late to get as much work done as possible and listening to his boyfriend whine about being left alone all the time, but by the end of the month, he’s got three finished paintings he’s pretty fond of.</p><p>He wasn’t one to usually get too self conscious about his art, but sometimes if he stared for too long, he’d start to notice little imperfections and inconsistencies he wasn’t all too happy with. Still, he had never hated any particular piece, except for maybe the one that his mom made him paint for her home office.</p><p>These though, the three paintings meant for Billy, when they were lined up on the table together, made him more than proud of himself.</p><p>One was a replication of a Polaroid Billy’d taken of the beach back home in Cali the day before he moved. The second was his prized Camaro in all its former glory, lost to irreparable fire damage.</p><p>The last was based off of a picture Max had found when she was digging through Billy’s dad’s storage. It was a shot taken by Billy himself when he was just little of his backyard at the property where he grew up, his first ever dog, a German Shepard named Sweetie, laying in the picketed yard. </p><p>Steve didn’t exactly do realism though, so they were more like interpretations. He didn’t know how exactly to describe what he did with his art, just that, the longer his style had time to develop, the more he favored blurry lines, unusual textures, and bright colors over trying to match hues and make everything look perfect.</p><p>Up until his senior year of high school, he’d been perfectly obsessed with getting every little thing about a painting just right, something about him that made him the favorite student of basically every art teacher in the district. But he’d grown out of that habit when he met Billy, and they learned that he was colorblind.</p><p>They only found out about it for the first time during an argument over whether or not Billy's car was blue. It absolutely has been blue and not green like Billy insisted, just as his sister's hair was definitely orange and not “maybe a pinkish-blonde color?” as Billy had put it.</p><p>In seventeen years, nobody but Steve had ever pointed out to him that maybe he was seeing colors any different than anyone else, and he felt sort of cheated. Steve wanted to do something to make him feel better, so he made him a painting where he adjusted his hues to how Billy described color.</p><p>Color theory had always been a topic he’d harbored a huge interest in, ever since he was just getting started in art as a kid, back then using tacky finger paints and crayons instead of the more refined mediums he used now, so it’s fun to play around with.</p><p>For Billy though, it had been so much more than just a way to experiment with art. It meant the world to him that someone would make accommodations for him, even for something so minor.</p><p>He’d cried the first time Steve showed him a painting like that, because it was so clear and so beautiful in a way unlike he’d ever been able to see before, and after that, Steve just never shook the habit of painting that way.</p><p>Even if his art might’ve looked a little funny to someone on the outside when he painted beaches pink and fall leaves teal, Billy appreciated them more than anything, and that only makes Steve all the more excited to give these newest paintings to him.</p><p>The plan had initially been to wait until a special occasion, their anniversary wasn’t too far off now, but he couldn’t stand the idea of knowing they were done and stashed away in the closet without getting to see Billy’s reaction, so he decided right now, on this regular old Monday evening in, would be the perfect time.</p><p>“Bills, can you c’mere a sec?” He calls after a moment working himself up, his heart pounding just at the thought of what his boyfriend would think of the gifts. </p><p>But Billy yells back, “Nope. I’m holdin’ the cat.”</p><p>Steve rolls his eyes to himself, there was no doubt that their cat was Billy’s gigantic, spoiled baby. “She’ll live if you put her down for one second. I need to show you somethin’.”</p><p>“Alright. Sorry, Bunker Buster.” Steve loves that Billy talks to the cat like she’s a little person, smiles to himself when he listens to him telling her in response to her meows, “I know kitty, but Stevie needs me.”</p><p>“What’s up, baby?” Billy comes over to him where he’s standing by the table, scorned cat tailing behind him to see why she’d been abandoned.</p><p>Steve can barely contain his excitement as he tells him, “Look.”</p><p>“These for me?” Billy’s smug, but flattered as he takes in the paintings, each propped up on its own easel to dry. </p><p>“As a thank you, for supporting me.” Steve explains, watching Billy’s face, the way his eyes soften at the explanation, and waiting for his reaction. He can’t help himself asking,  “Do you like ‘em?”</p><p>“S’beautiful, Stevie.” His words failing him, Billy leans in to kiss him, laughing against his mouth when Steve almost touched his face with hands still wet with paint. </p><p>Steve pulls away to ask, teasing, “You’re not just saying that cause you love me, are you?”</p><p>“You ever known me to be a suck up?” Billy asks. </p><p>“On occasion.” He pokes fun, reveling in the way it makes Billy chuckle real soft. “Remember when you met my mother?”</p><p>“Give me a break, I had to make a good impression.” Billy kisses him again, mutters against Steve’s lips between pecks, “But I’m not kissing ass. I love ‘em. Love you.”</p><p>“Love you too, Billy.” </p><p>Billy pulls away to pick up one of the paintings, the one of the Camaro, and holds it straight out in front of him. “Now where’re we gonna put these?”</p><p> </p><p>The paintings find their permanent home in the living room, right above their crummy TV set, since that’s where Billy spends most of his time. He shows them off to absolutely anyone who’ll lend him an ear, no matter if it’s his sister coming for a visit or a neighbor dropping in to borrow some sugar.</p><p>He talks and talks about them all them time, bragging about how talented his boyfriend is, and how they really liven up the living space, and don’t you think they’re just so beautiful?</p><p>It reminds Steve of how his mother used to be when company came over and they had a new designer couch or an antique vase to flaunt.</p><p>Seeing Billy like that, beaming with his own personality and happy as ever, is something Steve didn’t know he’d ever be able to have. </p><p>In truth, there were a lot of things really, that he never anticipated them being able to do.</p><p>Just a few years ago he thought he’d lost his Billy forever. Thought that he’d have to spend his life alone and broken because he’d never have the chance to reach what they could now.</p><p>But Billy had fought, tooth and nail he’d fought to get back to where he was before he’d gotten hurt. He would never be quite the same as he did before, the muscle mass he lost, the capacity of his lungs, that was all gone for good.</p><p>But the Billy he was now, sitting on their ugly floral couch with a sparkle in his eye, a bright smile, and a heavy cat all curled up in his lap, that’s all he ever wanted.</p><p>For now, maybe they were stuck in Bloomington, Indiana instead of living it up in sunny San Francisco, but they had time. To grow, to appreciate, to heal. And that was all they really needed.</p><p>Everything was in its place, and they were happy.</p>
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